


vale somnium

by frozennightmare



Category: Doctor Who, Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: Angst, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-11-26
Updated: 2013-11-26
Packaged: 2018-01-02 16:29:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,382
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1059042
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/frozennightmare/pseuds/frozennightmare
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Doctor dreams of many things, and tells Clara about a lot, but there are some things he will never, ever mention.</p>
            </blockquote>





	vale somnium

**Author's Note:**

> the title may just be me being extra-cruel with your emotions.  
> inspired by the ending monolouge in the 50th, but not really meant as a fixit of any fashion. and of terms of my varying tags for the fandom, i'm still not sure which one to use.

Sometimes, the Doctor  _dreams._

 _  
_He dreams of planets that grow stars like some people grow wheat, galaxies that turn in perfect rhythym to the ticking of the clock, races with eyes that are really the size of saucers. He dreams of so many things, places he's been, people he's known, always reencountering them. The Doctor doesn't dream so much as he _remembers,_ remembers the grass blowing in the breeze on Hellenica, Martha wanting to know why the natives liked her and not him, laughing over the fact that the Amazonians were alien. The sigh of the river at Criniti, stardust swirling around the boat's paddle, lonely comets fluttering through the air like birds, the delight on Amy's face as she catches a glowing rock for herself. Sarah Jane babbling on about her latest journalistic endeavour in a tiny cafe in Croyton, K-9 perched up on a chair like he's the third human there. Mickey and Jack dragging him into some Torchwood adventure, hiding their weapons behind their backs and pretending he doesn't notice. Donna, dancing around in a massive skirt and pushing tea crates at Boston, not caring she was the only woman on the ship. River dragging him along on one of her daft archaelogical digs, pulling artifacts of his past life out of the sand without even realizing what she's got. Romana purposefully grounding them on Earth for three weeks, demanding that she find out why he loves this damned planet so much. So many dreams, so many memories, not even so often actual pictures but just flashes. A brief piece of an alien melody, the wooden crash of the door at Clara's, a flash of laughter and a blue jacket. Rain beading on a hospital window as he watches Martha do her job, not even realizing he's there, the daft new man with a bowtie. Rory puttering around in a new suit, Amy fixing his plaid bowtie and running her fingers through his graying hair, saying something about  _if only the Doctor could see you now._ River taking his hand in the alleyway, telling him that he could take them home, if he wants, turning her down becuase he's done far too much damage in the Pond's life. It's over now, it's done, and he's not gonna make himself go back. He's not sure he'll be able to let go again if he does. Sarah Jane waving him goodbye after he walks away from her apartment, still full of fire even though she's gotten sick, promising him she'll still be around next time he comes calling. (He doesn't go back, because he doesn't want to encounter the possibilty he won't be.) Donna rustling around to make dinner for her family, talking at her usual pace of five thousand words a minute, not even aware that the man who helped her carry her groceries home was once her best friend in all of creation. She wouldn't recognize him anymore, even if she knew who he was. His entire life is a muddled mess, barely clinging on from one companion to the next, not wanting to admit to himself the irreversible damage he does, not wanting to let go. He dreams of Clara, who he clings onto simply because he has nothing else to cling on to. He would have given up this search for her long ago, if he really cared about her. About her life.

Clara asks him if he dreams, and he tells her he does. He tells her, irrationally, stupidly so, about all these things, because who else is there? He tells her about Jack, who he left alone in a bar, how he still feels guilty about Ianto and the 456 every time he closes his eyes. He tells her all the wild and crazy and stupid things other planets have shown him, all the people he's met over the years. He doesn't know why Clara should be so privileged with all these details, she hardly knows him, but he feels like he has to. Somewhere, deep in his gut, he suspects she will be the last one. His last companion. That after this is all over he will simply go mad, become the Valeyard like he was always destined to, and continue prattling about the universe until someone has the good sense to shoot him dead. He talks and talks simply because he doesn't know what else to do.

_I dream about where I've been._

_Mate, those aren't dreams. They're memories. Don't you ever dream about where you're going? Impossible things, things that could never ever happen?_

_There's no such thing as impossible for me._

Rule #1. 

The Doctor lies.

He hates that rule now, it's rubbish, because all it's ever done is make him keep secrets. Secrets, he once thought, protected him, but at least Clara showed him he was wrong. Maybe that's why he tells her so much. Making up for all the secrets he's kept over the years, all the secrets that have killed so many. The blood on his hands could drown millions more. 

Clara, he realizes with a tinge of regret, is just an attempt to get it right. She should be more than that, she  _deserves_ more, but he can't manage it. She's his bid to fix everything, all those secrets he kept, all those people he left behind. All he feels anymore is guilt, terrible, soul-eating guilt, and he wants it to go away, to fix it with Clara, but it  _won't._ It is always just  _there._

 _  
__Really? All those years traveling the universe, you've never had something you've wished you'd done? Something you wished you could do._

 _  
_He dreams of _her._

The way she tucks a flyaway strand of blonde hair behind her ear, one hand leaning against the console of the TARDIS as she slowly walks around, telling him something with the precison that lets him know exactly what's coming next. The solid sound of her laugh after the third alien thinks they're married that day, the way she doesn't react when he jokes they could be. Her ruffling his hair every morning when he's hunched over a cup of tea, claiming it looks better that way, tugging him by his tie so he's standing up against the kitchen sink and letting her dissolve him with kisses. She does that a lot, especially when he's not expecting it, just grabbing on to him and leaving her mark, not just on his mouth but on his soul. He still hates himself for never saying it, those three forbidden words. He thinks he always will.

 Sometimes those dreams twist, away from the fabric of memory, away from the world where he still wears a tie and a trenchcoat. Sometimes he's a stranger, a tweed-clad man standing in the street as she flashes into existence, not recognizing him but smiling all the same. 

The Doctor likes those dreams the best.

He wishes he could crack apart the universe and stare past the Void, see the other side of reality where she must be now. Her life is probably terribly domestic, not  _his sort of thing at all (_ except he could make it be his thing, for her.) She probably wakes up every morning with a Doctor she knows won't run off at her side, filling her life with platitudes and constancies and beautiful, human mistakes.  She must be happy. He hopes she's happy. He's not sure he could live with himself if she's not.

If, for some mysterious and earth-shattering reason,  the ghost he calls Rose Tyler ever crosses his path again, he will tell her those three words. The Doctor knows she must know by now, that her human Doctor has probably told her a thousand times, but he just wants her to hear it. From him.

But for now, she is a ghost of his dreams, and there she must stay. There he can pretend that he doesn't see her  _all the fucking time,_ still dancing around the TARDIS, still laughing at the stupidest things, the ghost of her touch wrapped around him when he wakes up in the morning. 

He only dreams sometimes, he tells Clara. She assumes it's just a Time Lord thing, but the truth is, he just doesn't sleep much.

This is why.

 

 

 

 


End file.
